Category: LIfestyle

I have been a solid Dog-Mom for the last three years, and like a Black small-footed Peggy Hill, here I find myself pregnant with a son that I never imagined would be. Yes, I know where babies come from. No, I didn’t think that I was in the danger zone. I was wrong.

Now I’m 34 weeks into this deal, and I’ve finally landed on a solid feeling about this whole situation.

This Ain’t Cute!

Don’t get me wrong, I can intellectualize the fact that this is a beautiful scientific process, but I need someone to articulate that to my hips and my plans for the future.

Seriously.

I was the kind of girl that collected horror stories along the way to help me stay on the kid-free path, despite the ticking of my biological clock. While that helped create a nice callous around my heartstrings, trying to undo three decades worth of opinion is harder than it sounds, especially in such a short time frame as 40 weeks.

I’m shook.

Even with my Rolodex of easily accessible worst-case scenarios, now that I’m in the go zone of this “journey” I’m finding out new and unnerving things.

Here’s where I get graphic and say things that my family and church folk shouldn’t read. If you’re trying to keep me in a certain light stop reading right now.

When you really have no idea what you’re doing, and you have no desire to start a new dynamic in your immediate friendships in which you start discussing bodily functions; you get on the Internet like a respectable nerd and find out things from strangers. That action leads me to the realization that there’s such thing as a “pad popsicle”. The young lady on the post (not the article I just linked) had concocted a menagerie of aloe, coconut oil, sage, bitters and wheatgrass (who knows, I zoned out) for the purpose of freezing the mix on a huge sanitary napkin, to place in her panties after giving birth.

I had to scroll to the comment section to see if there was anyone else completely confused with me. Nah. Everybody on the thread had their own recipe ready to rock and the old school moms had stories of how there’s a contraption at the hospital that you just twist and it gets cold like something out of a hiking kit.

Do you know what kind of beat up your “purse” has to be for COLD to feel soothing? I’ve had some… “oh Lord just leave the hot rag in place” moments in my life, but NEVER in the history of this kitty box have I been so swollen and that I have ever even contemplated an ice pack.

I’m out here trying to take over the world. Same thing I do every day, Pinky. So there’s not a lot of room for dramatic emotional shifts. As a person that has dealt with anger issues that reach as far back to the age of 5; hormonal imbalance, physical changes, and mouthy people just don’t mix. I’ve found myself having to pray aloud to keep the urge to heel kick someone in the mouth at bay.
The fact that I’m not in prison is proof that prayer works. I’ve found myself feeling levels of mad as hell that rival my years as a brand new teenager. Who has time for that? Remaining sociable and acceptable in public is probably draining more out of me than this huge baby inside of me that likes to boogie to music and wiggle when the food I eat is tasty.

Between that and moments of crushing sadness, I’m ready for this kid to get done cooking and come on out, so I can establish his LLC, schedule his music lessons and teach him how we roll. I’ve lost and missed out on enough things that I generally don’t spend a lot of my normal time being sad. So, this whole tear act is beyond annoying because I absolutely know that whatever it is, it’s not that deep; and with the emotional swings comes the act of faking like everything is just fine. I honestly don’t know the answer at any given time. Sometimes I’m cool, sometimes I break things that I don’t care about. This is stupid.

Ain’t cute thing #3- There’s apparently a protocol to doing this whole thing, from pictures of my waistline disappearing gradually to inspirational quotes and deep shit I’m supposed to be spewing to the masses about how I’m transforming as a woman. I’m 33 years old, at this point I’m as grown as it gets until I start going through the change of life. Since the beginning of my pregnancy there’s been a wave of articles on how black women are the most likely to die during and after childbirth so excuse me if I can’t give a damn about all the mushy stuff until after I get through this thing I’ve feared and avoided my entire life, alive. Thanks. Not to keep talking about the emotional piece, but with that, I check my blood pressure on a regular basis, especially after a mood shift. I also weigh myself twice a day, in the beginning, it was to be sure I didn’t lose too much, and now it’s to be sure that the gain is within reason to my height. I’m much too busy trying to be my own advocate, watch his seemingly rapid growth (his ass is over 5lbs already) and be sure that there’s absolutely nothing else that I can do to create the best situation. I don’t have time to be cutesy. Sorry.

Ain’t cute thing #4-

I don’t ever like to be touched in places beyond my hands and shoulders. There’s something about a pregnant belly that makes people feel like they need to reach out and put their possibly washed, but more likely to have just touched a doorknob hands on your good clothes. I don’t even remember who it was that did it, but I’m at my Grandmother’s funeral trying to be all dignified and comport myself in a manner that wouldn’t embarrass the deceased if she saw me, and missed a belly touch dodge. I let it ride on the strength of time and place, but I was visibly upset according to my Sorority sisters that caught my body language from over my shoulder.

If you wouldn’t rub my belly to admire my work in the gym, randomly touching my belly because I’ve been screwing just seems weird to me, but hey, let the spirit move you as you see fit… it’s creepy. That’s my uterus. If you’re not directly connected with what’s on the way out, what’s the obsession?

Ain’t cute thing #5- I’ve been doing Kegels since the age of 15. So imagine my surprise when I find out that sometimes when the moon is just right, a gag or a good joke can undo over a decade and a half of pussy power and send me into peed in panties.

You’re talking about one disappointed woman.

I take joy in the small things in life, not stinking, being clean, having control over bodily functions. Here’s the conundrum, I’ve doubled the exercises but this baby’s head has an 8cm diameter as of last Thursday so there’s a piece of me that can’t put together a loosening and tightening routine that will soothe my paranoia.

All jokes aside, I’m looking forward to what this little life is going to do to the rest of my world. However, freaking out about strangers being around him to not knowing exactly how my leave situation is going to work, as a planner I have way more questions than answers and that sucks the last little bit of what could be fun right out of it all.

Even more, I’m bringing a brand new Black male into the world and if my Punnett square analysis is accurate, he’s going to be big and chocolate. I’m preoccupied with determining the balance of making sure he’s exposed to multiple cultures and hoping that he has a healthy understanding that everything that this world has to offer isn’t necessarily for him in the same way that all people enjoy them.

Can I afford to try and skip all of that, and if I do, will that allow him the maximum room to grow, or will it get him killed? See…it ain’t cute.

I’ve been away for a while taking care of some business that simply did not allow for much time to blog. I took a stab at completing a review but just like everything else that didn’t make it to priority one boarding on my mind plane, it got left behind. I decided to come to you today because there’s something positive from my journey that I’d like to share.

Finnas shouldn’t last always.

This is derivative of my life’s driving philosophy long before I learned of a bucket list or anything else. My objective in life is to take everything that I’ve stated I’m fixing to/finna (depending on your country upbringing), or getting ready to do, and turn them into a list of things that I did. I should not spend my entire life with that list looking the same, and never checking anything off. If you follow my work from other blogs, you may already know that I have worked so many different jobs, and in so many different industries, especially during the dark times in my life, and that philosophy is part of why I’ve worked that way.

How do those things relate? Well ever since I found out that I needed to take control of my own destiny when it came to getting to college by joining the Navy I set a few long term goals in those moments; I’d have good credit, I’d own a house, I’d get a couple of degrees, I’d learn how to function in all of the parts of a company (walking corporation was the term I used at around 13), I’d start my own business.This has been the year of the dying “finnas” and I am grateful to get a chance to share my drive and strategies with others via independent management and consulting.

Girl What’s the Point?

I really want to help other people learn how to get into the mode of attacking their “one day” list. Just because I’m the type of person that will work at a doggy daycare scraping poo and feeding dogs just to be sure that my credit doesn’t drop below a place that it can be repaired, doesn’t mean that works for everyone. There’s both an art and a science to capturing your dreams and I’ve simplified them into a few universal tips below.

1.Be Early for your deadlines. I mean every time you get something to do, kill it as fast and accurately as you possibly can. Look at a task as an enemy that must be destroyed with extreme prejudice and show up early for your meetings.

2.Over-deliver. Top yourself every time you get called up to do something. If somebody wants you to make a hat, make that hat and also make some embellishments that can be interchanged. Do the most because everything that leaves your hands, whether you actually write your name on it or not, is a reflection of you.

3.Give props to anybody else that’s out here doing their best. The positive energy from giving love and good vibes to others in your position will set you up metaphysically to be in the right places and surrounded by the right people.

4.Do not be afraid to change your strategy to reach you ultimate goal. I went to school for a whole lot of things with the idea in mind that I’d use those skills to help me work through college, then the GI Bill changed and even though I don’t need those other things to make a living, they have opened doors that allow me to be extremely versatile in how I survive and thrive. I still stopped focusing on those things and captured the pieces of paper that would take me where I was trying to go. The only wrong answer in trying to win is giving up, everything else is up for interpretation.

5.Recognize the power in sacrifice. There’s lots of things that I’ve had to say no to in the last 7 years in order to be in a position to say yes to the things that are on target with my goals. You are the only one responsible for you getting where you’re trying to be. This isn’t exclusive to financial parameters, but check your energy as well. Sometimes people, places and/or things won’t put you in the right head space making ‘No’ the only answer that makes sense.

“It hurts but it may be the only way.” -Kanye West (the version we all love)

In the interest of keeping this short I just want you to know that I’m still here knocking out finnas, but that list has gotten extremely short in the past six months. I walk for my MBA in May, and I finish all my classes in August (let’s pray this 4.0 sticks). I value being able to come to you all and pour out my heart and mind on things. I hope that you find this post increases your positive energy and if you needed a little motivation to bust a move, I hope that it did that too.

They should really stop the normal rhetoric at both high school and college graduations. Although not in my case, that is where most of the new wave of responsible people hear some motivational speech about taking risks and enjoying the ride. While many of those speeches provide the hope and optimism needed to brave this whole new lifestyle that will never end until the day that you die, they usually miss a fey key points. Today I present to you that missing piece, in the Art, Science and Agony of Adulting.

The ART

The art is in the understanding. Social constructs are like grammar, you have to know the rules first to break them. Here is where you can know that it’s polite to bring a gift to the baby shower, but bring cash instead and still be celebrated as a timely and thoughtful gift giver. This also includes knowing just how late to be for church so that for you it only lasts an hour and a half. There’s no right or wrong in doing what you want to do because you’re an Adult…and nobody can stop you.

The Science.

When you’re an adult, you’re in charge of several things; when and what you eat and how much, what time you go to bed, how many friends you can have over at one time, how many things you can buy in the store. You are also in charge of funding, sourcing and coordinating all of the activities of your life. The science is in measuring your lifestyle with your income and the obligations required to maintain both. This is where lots of people fail. This is why there’s such thing as credit and even more why people deal with “bad credit”. Adulting is not cheap when you try to live a life like the music videos and reality TV shows that you grew up watching (unless you’re strictly a Survivor fan) and most of the time you need a job to do half of the things. That means that you have to figure out what you need to know in order to qualify for the job that aids in creating the lifestyle you want followed by a coordinated effort to secure it through proper networking and application of the acquired knowledge.

Yeah, I know…

#THEAGONY

Here are some things that can happen when you do too much of one and not enough of the other between The Art & The Science:

I remember the first time I got out of the house and out of intense supervision. I was in the Navy and even though we had fitness standards, I’d just spent over 10 weeks only eating food that was provided. When I got the chance to eat at a restaurant again it took me years to stop. I even found a way to go on a diet with restaurant food… why? Because I was grown and nobody could stop me. As I embark on this latest fitness journey, I just wish that somebody had, but that’s not how Adulting works..you’re supposed to just know. Why? Because you’re the adult.

Lately my entire life has been revolving around school and work. I have to literally schedule and budget fun. The stinking trick is, that’s not really how fun works. You can plan a trip to Vegas, but it’s the spontaneous decision to sit through the timeshare presentation that gets you free tickets to see Tyson Beckford naked.

But bills and future money take precedence over right now fun because that’s the formula that we’ve all been taught that keeps us from sleeping on the park bench. So the Agony is in knowing that even though you are totally in control of what you actually do, nobody is going to stop you and also nobody is going to bail you out. It’s a tough pill to swallow this whole Adult thing, and just think, it lasts the rest of your life.

Until next time… may your coloring not rely on the placement of the lines.